I sat cross legged on the balcony as he rolled me a cigarette. He didn't smoke but he rolled perfectly. His perfectionism was killing me.
"The other night I filmed myself on my webcam." he said, rolling, rolling, thumbs turned inward. "I filmed myself going to sleep. I wanted to see if I talked or had nightmares or whatever..."
"Yeah..."
"So I watched the film back this morning. Turns out, I woke up in the middle of the night and chucked all of my things onto the floor. My books, my notepad, everything. It was like watching Big Brother or something. I mean, it was me, but it wasn’t me. I would never chuck my books onto the floor."
"Well…we all think that we would never chuck our books onto the floor, but we do don’t we? Hey you can really see the stars out here."
"I know. It's wonderful with a telescope. I have a very good telescope."
"Where is it?"
"Upstairs. We have a space gazing window. It’s my telescope but Frederick likes it too. But then he always smudges up the lens." He handed me the cigarette, thin as candy and gummed down with precision. "I could teach you about space."
"Oh, please, I'd never take it in."
"Yes you would."
I lit the cigarette and the paper glowed.
"I just like looking."
'You can't just look and not know. You won't even know what you're looking at."
I looked at him.
"Yeah, I know."